


Give You Back The Open Sky

by chicagoartnerd



Series: The Darkness I Became [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Flashbacks, Gen, Pre-Femslash, Space Pirates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-02
Updated: 2013-04-02
Packaged: 2017-12-07 06:00:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/745104
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chicagoartnerd/pseuds/chicagoartnerd
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Irene Adler and Molly Hooper come from very different backgrounds but even so their fates seem intertwined. Irene is an Orion space pirate on her way to dismantling the Shadow Syndicate and the Orion slave trade. And Molly is a young and brilliant Star Fleet Engineer. This particular installment in their story features Irene remembering how they met on the S.S. Bartholomew all those years ago. This is a Star Trek/Sherlock fusion AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Give You Back The Open Sky

**Author's Note:**

> My friend and collaborator villainette and I wrote several summaries for this universe and the stories within. This one is written by myself but future installments might be penned by her. As it goes I'm writing more for this universe right now. There needs to be a Trek crossover with everything because SPACE. Yup.

_“Memory is a strange Bell—Jubilee, and Knell.” –Emily Dickinson_

 

Sparks flew up into her face for a fourth time as she slammed her multi-tool into the control panel release. There had to be some sort of manual override but she couldn’t remember what it was for this damnable ancient Selorian Freighter.

The guns had just been so nice. As it had turned out it was a hack job graft and the actual ship was a bit of a death trap.  

The S.S. card had read a relatively new model cruiser and the outside was immaculate and armed to the teeth. For all intents and purposes it appeared to be a small, obscenely paranoid merchant vessel.

Even as she had walked the corridors everything appeared slightly dusty but new and functional. But in reality all it had going for it was a great paint job and heavy artillery. The guts were rotten old trash. It was a good thing she was always in the market for scrap, especially expensive laser powered scrap.

Unfortunately as soon as she’d gone to activate the ship’s main propulsion system the entire control panel had shorted out.

Now she was stuck there in neutral space with no way to get to a trade post and unload the blighted thing.

Kicking it with her knee high leather boots didn’t seem to have the desired effect.

And although it would be wonderfully satisfying to beat it with her riding crop, that would probably be ineffective as well.

She had spared the crew’s lives and sent them off all jammed like the clowns they were into the one-man craft she had arrived in. It would have been a better idea to have just killed them and kept her ship, but killing tended to draw too much attention.

Ships got commandeered and robbed all the time in Neutral Space. It was hard to make a name for yourself that way unless you were thieving major trade ships that belonged to one of the five Shadow Syndicates.

Very few lived long enough to brag about doing that. So for the most part she remained anonymous and she liked it that way. It was easier to gather information and bribe, steal, and cheat her way into power.

Because power was what she craved and it was the only tool that would allow her to exact more than her proper pound of flesh.

Reflecting on it now she was wishing the former crew a slow and painful death in space of starvation. When actually she had no one to blame but herself.

Rule number one of being a space pirate; if it looked too good to be true it probably was.  When she saw this perfectly shiny little morsel of a trade cruiser just drifting quietly through space she should have pegged it for a junker and a criminal vessel immediately.

Again she was lured in with the promise of even bigger weapons at her disposal. Any one who told you size didn’t matter had really shitty guns. It appeared it was time to scale back and rethink her current plan of escape.

First thing was first though she had to get this ship moving again. The life support systems appeared to be functioning fully so Irene had the benefit of clean air and gravity but for how long?

Suddenly a thought came knocking insistently behind her eyeballs. She had seen some one fix an engine like this before.

_Hell the girl had practically walked her through it fifteen years ago._

* * *

 

Her older sister Abbey had been sold, and her mother before her, and every other Orion woman Irene had ever known.

But she was half human so maybe there was some sort of Federation planet or station she could escape to. As it was she didn’t have much of a choice. She was an unsold slave on her way to market on Verex III. Her mother was her last lifeline, a powerful slave of a human officer in the Orion Syndicate.

She had told her all of their ways and showed Irene how to bend any man to her will, her mother was a master within the system. Orion women who masqueraded as slaves to men secretly ran the Syndicate. But what she saw was a different type of inprisonment.

Their pervasive hormones subjugated men but the women were no freer. Bound to forever play the role of the carnal slave while hiding how cunning and brilliant they really were.  Hiding in the shadows of something ancient and awful.

Not to mention how non-Orion women were treated in the slave trade. She was lucky to be an acceptable shade of green because it ensured she had some level of protection and power, that she would be sold some where to some influential male.

She was half-human though and thus less important and high up in the system. But the thing was she didn’t want to be a slave even in name. She hated that charade and saw no need to play at it.

If Orion women, or women in general, wanted to rule or be in positions of wealth and power they should do it on their own merit with their intellect and skill. She wanted out.

The problem was she was usually in Borderland space. The Borderlands were the lawless neutral zones outside of Federation control under jurisdiction of the five Shadow Syndicates, the most powerful being the Orion Syndicate.

But the heavy Orion cruiser they were on was about to experience a major communications system failure while in Federation Space. She wasn’t going to be delicate and was just going to gut it and run, after all if her plan worked and a Federation ship within com range heard the distress call she had hacked into it then she would be free. Well relatively more free.

They were in Federation space in a ship full of slaves. Slavery was entirely illegal and if the ship she was on was intercepted then they would have no choice but to liberate all the “cargo” on it.

But if her plan didn’t work out and the crew figured out it was her that programmed the fake distress call then she would be executed, as well as her family, no questions asked.

When a member of the Syndicate failed all other members that vouched for them would die as well. Her betrayal would be seen in that light and that would be the end of her mother and father.

This was her only real chance before the world she hated closed down and locked her inside its gilded jaws.

She rewired the control panel with her makeshift soldering tool and ran before the screens could shut down fully. Irene didn’t stop running in small controlled bursts until she was back at her cabin.

Once she arrived all she had left to do was wait and hope.

Luckily all the variables she had no control over favored her that day and the S.S. Bartholomew hailed their ship.

Suddenly there was mass chaos as they were boarded. She had forgotten about that.

The crew would try to convince the Federation ship that nothing was amiss but if they failed then the entire population of the ship would commit mass suicide.

That was the price for failure on Orion. There was no way to warn the boarding crew of this fact and she was unsure if any of her fellow captives would listen to her. Most of them were off-world women who had been taken from space stations and different planets and sold into the slavery.

A great many of them were younger than her, which was terrifying.

There was about to be a massacre that she was suddenly in no position to prevent, all for her freedom.

She heard the distinctive screech of a hand phaser and knew it was all over. She curled  up into a small ball on her narrow cot and waited for the end of it. It was hard not to think too extensively on how badly she’d screwed this up.  

The door to her cabin slid open in a silent click and she heard an unfamiliar female voice call out,

“We’ve got another girl alive!”

Then as the figure approached she heard a gentle voice say,

“It’s okay. You’re safe now.”

She didn’t dare look up in case the figure vanished and left her looking into the eyes of death. Instead she scrunched in tighter on herself and shook. When a light hand landed on her shoulder she froze and then felt suddenly exhausted.

 

She woke up in the bright white light of a Starfleet medical bay.

Blinking to try and take in her surroundings she caught the attention of the medical officer who immediately came over to her.

The woman looked to be in her late thirties with soft features and graying brown hair. She smiled reassuringly and said,

“You’re looking much better. Think you feel up to talking for a bit? If not I can give you another sedative and you can sleep for a little while longer.”

She viciously shook her head no.

Irene didn’t want to be drugged again because when she was drugged she couldn’t observe. The more knowledge she could glean about where she was the better off she would be. Knowledge was her only weapon against what the entire world set against her. The more intelligence she possessed on any given subject the safer she would be.

But conversely she didn’t much feel like talking to this woman. Knowing when to give information and what information to give was also a power. One of the only ones she possessed at the moment.

“Alright then no more tranquilizers for you I promise. Now what is your name?”

She shied away towards the wall almost off the edge of the examination table she was perched on. Then avoided eye contact mostly out of habit; it was a submissive gesture because direct eye contact with anyone on Orion was considered a sexual challenge when performed by a woman.

But it also served to hide the emotions storming across her features from this unknown Starfleet med tech.

“Not the talkative type then? That’s fine. I’ll ask you yes or no questions. Alright preliminary biological scans indicate that you are half human half Orion is that correct?”

On the surface the question seemed safe to answer and yet she still hesitated before finally stiffly nodding to the affirmative.

“My chart says you are also around fifteen years of age is this correct?”

Again she paused before slightly nodding yes.

“And from what we were able to piece together from the ship’s manifest as well as other survivors your name is Irene Adler and you are an unsold slave in the Orion Syndicate.”

Irene hunched in, pulling her legs up to her chest, defeated.

If this woman already had all this information then why was she asking? What was the point of trying to drag it out of an obviously traumatized young girl? Unless there was something else she wanted from getting her to talk.

“Well that’s really all we need for our records. If you like you can join the rest of the people we rescued from your ship, dreadful business that, or you can stay here in the sick bay with me. It doesn’t matter much at the moment either way.”

Her curiosity attempted to make her stay and see what the woman meant by it not mattering, but at the moment she also wanted to run.

So she mechanically stood and walked towards the door out of the medical bay. The woman called lightly after her,

“The quarters you’ll be looking for are at the end of the hall on the left. If you get lost simply ask the wall for directions.”

And with that she heard the pneumatic click of door snick shut behind her and she went right instead.

Irene was going to see as much of the ship as she could before they tried to lock her up. The hallways of the ship were almost blindingly bright white and plain poly-plastic, very simple and utilitarian. Not at all like any of the Orion ships with their opulent dark colored walls, sensual carpets, and multi-patterned drapery.

This ship looked practically naked, a blank slate of a place. There were rows of opaque gray doors on both sides of the hallway that were most likely crew quarters and at the very end of the passageway there was a lift. Curious she walked into and said loudly,

“Lower Deck please.”

The lift chimed lightly and in a mechanically female voice intoned,

“Going down.”

She was shocked that it was complying with her command. Most ships in the Orion fleet used voice recognizer technology. Anyone speaking a non-registered command was locked out of almost all areas of the ship, especially the bowels of the ship.

Perhaps all the captives had access to any part of the ship in case of emergency or some other logical reason because it was completely alien to think of herself as free to wander. Maybe she could even get on the bridge and see how the ship was flown.

The doors opened on the lower deck and the familiar whirr of a particle engine greeted her. But some rather unfamiliar scraping and clinking of metal also caught her attention. This time her inquisitive nature really did win out as she rounded a corner to her right to investigate the source of the clinking.

She stopped when she saw a small figure hard at work dismantling a dismantled engine control panel. It was obvious that the control panel wasn’t to anything actually flying the ship so she dismissed the immediate thought of sabotage. And as she drew closer she saw that figure was that of ten year old girl, her long brown hair pulled back in high ponytail, her round face contorted with the effort of prying open the last grate before the processor. She must have made some sort of detectable noise because the girl started and dropped her clumsy adult sized multi-tool. When she looked up her brown eyes were blown huge and she squeaked,

“You’re green!”

Irene took a step back in surprise at the absurdity of the statement and the young girl’s hands flew to cover her mouth right after she said it. She then pulled nervously at her ponytail before she blustered on,

“Sorry! I mean of course you’re green you’re Orion right? I’ve just never seen an Orion before, no that’s not right. I’ve seen one on Toby but never in real life. Toby pull up a picture of an Orion.”

The small cube shaped computer next to her leg mewled and then projected a three quarters hologram of a barely dressed Orion woman. The girl turned luminescent pink and stammered,

“Toby turn that off! That’s not what I meant. Er what I meant was, nevermind. Sorry I’m Molly Hooper. What’s your name?”

As she fumbled through her speech she had been moving progressively closer to her. Finally, standing a foot away, she extended her small synthetic lubricant covered hand towards her in a earth gesture of greeting.  

She was too shocked not to respond in kind with a quiet,

“My name is Irene.”

Molly shook her hand vigorously and smiled up brilliantly at her,

“That’s a good name. Not that any other name would have been bad mind you. But um it’s a very fine name as far as they go. Do you want to learn how to calibrate a flux circuit?”

She didn’t wait for her to answer yes or no and simply went back over the control panel she had been taking apart and started to talk non-stop to her.

Molly went on and on about the mechanics of what she was doing but also other things like her favorite foods and what she liked to watch on the com screens when she wasn’t tinkering with machines. Because machines were her favorite thing.

Machines had a language all their own and were always reliable if you knew what to say to them.

“Did you know we are all machines of a sort? That’s why I don’t mind helping my Mom out in the medical bay every once and awhile. When she explained that every biological organism was made up of wires and electricity and systems like a machine it wasn’t so scary anymore.”

She merely nodded and then pointed to some loose wires towards the back of the enclosed circuit board,

“What do those do?”

Molly flushed and said,

“Oh! I forgot those! They’re the voice command cables. I guess this rehab will have to be manual input only. Oh well it doesn’t have to be up to federation standards it’s just for fun.”

That struck her like a blow. What was this little girl doing playing with old starship tech in the basement of a Starfleet cruiser? The clues were there but not all of them were adding up to her,

“What are you doing down here?”

Molly looked bewildered at the question but answered anyway,

“Um rebuilding this control panel?”

She shook her head and let some of the frustration she was feeling now slip into her voice,

“No. I mean why is some little kid down here playing around with old ship parts on an active duty Starfleet Cruiser?”

Molly flinched, taking her frustration for anger, and shrank back inside the guts of the control panel,

“My Mom is chief medical officer on the S.S. Bart. I can go wherever she goes just so long as I keep up with my schooling. Which is so easy I spend all my extra time down here building and rebuilding stuff. The chief engineer Anderson doesn’t care. He thinks I really can’t build anything. But he’s about to be very wrong.”

With the last comment she shoved the panel cover back on and soldered it shut with her multi-tool.

A quick grunt and she stood up, wiped her hands down the front of her gray work coveralls, then proceeded to program a command into the control panel.

Suddenly what Irene had seen as mechanical debris at the base of panel began to blink to life. Soon every piece and part was glowing with iridescent blue lights.

She pressed in another command and all the pieces began to blink on and off in synchronized patterns, making waves and hopscotch type jumps of light. The array danced with blue shimmering to an unheard melody and she watched mesmerized while Molly clapped her hands in sporadic time and grinned in triumph.

“It’s ‘Let It Be.’”

She jerked her head up from the light display and looked at her tipping her head to the side. Her smile faded and she suddenly looked tiny again. Not making eye contact,

“It’s an old earth song by a band from Liverpool, where my Mum's from. Not important. Uh dinner’s soon. Do you want to come to the Mess with me?”

There it was again; she was flooded with panic.

Irene really wasn’t supposed to be here and she hadn’t done any of the reconnaissance she had intended to. And now she would probably never have the chance to because she spent all her worthless time with this strange girl.  

She backed up nervously and shook her head, then made to turn around and run when Molly called out to her,

“If you want to you can come back later. Uh if you don’t have anything better to do. It’s not terribly exciting to watch me solder things.”

That desperate young voice made her stop.

“No. You’re not boring. Can you show me how to fix an engine some time?”

She looked over at her face and saw it grow and explode into glee like a supernova.

“Yes! I’ve wanted to tinker with some of the extra tech Anderson has in storage but he won’t let me yet. Maybe if you’re there when I ask he’ll let me. He thinks I need ‘adult’ supervision.”

She rolled her eyes at the last bit and Irene smiled despite her doubt at her “adult” presence being a positive factor for Molly.

Then she bowed deeply in good-bye and Molly looked surprised again before bowing clumsily in return and shouting “bye!”  

Irene went back around the corner to the lift and back up to the second level.

Instead of going to the quarters where the rest of the rescued slaves were she went back to med bay.  

The door opened as soon as she stood in front of it and she noticed the only person there was Molly’s mother. After meeting the girl in the lower levels she could now see the family resemblance.

There wasn’t anyone on this ship she could truly trust but the closest thing she had experienced to it was those few hours she had spent down there fixing that control panel. So she steeled her emotions and said quietly to her,

“I want to stay here.”

Molly’s mother looked up at Irene, smiled faintly, nodded, and gestured at the rows of raised white beds,

“Take your pick, you can have whichever you like. Dinner is in fifteen minutes if you’re hungry. Even if you’re not I would recommend eating seeing as you probably haven’t for at least twenty four hours.”

She jumped at that. So that was how long she had been out under sedation. How much had happened to determine her ultimate fate in that amount of time? It was probably too much to worry about now.

She mutely nodded and sat on the bed farthest from the door.

When the woman got up and left she waited a beat before following her out the door and down the corridor to the lift. She pressed the screen and selected the third floor Mess and began to wonder exactly how many floors were on the S.S. Bart.

The other survivors from the Freighter were all crowded together in a clump towards the back of the cafeteria but she didn’t go to join them. Her desire to be associated with them was gone for the moment. She needed time to think without fear and they would not help her in that endeavor.

Ambition and her mind had figured out a way to be free. The rest of them had been complacent, maybe even calmly naive, in the slave trade so they wouldn’t be of much help to her.

 

Instead she sat down with Molly and her Mom and ate the strange homogenized meal that was placed in front of her. It was quite obvious some of the mush there had been a freeze dried cube at some recent point in its life.

Molly looked overjoyed to see her and wouldn’t stop babbling about her next idea for a project. But when Irene didn’t show any signs of interest she slowed to a trickle and eventually directed her attention towards telling her mother about the light display she had made that afternoon.

“And then Irene came and she helped me finish the coordinative wiring. She’s really good at knowing what wires went where. Can she help me tomorrow too?”

Irene stiffened. Molly’s mother already knew too much about her, what if she figured out she was the one who wrecked the ship’s communications and hacked the distress signal?

Then she looked apologetically at her and said,

“If you want to that is! Sorry I shouldn’t have asked Mom like you weren’t sitting there!”

Irene shoved her metal utensil in the clear green gelatinous substance farthest from her and said quietly,

“That’s fine. I’d like to help.”

Both Molly and her mother perked up at this.

Then her mother turned to both of them,

“Of course. I’ll make Anderson give you access to the stored parts department so you can keep yourself busy for the afternoon tomorrow. After you finish your maths of course.”

Molly was practically jumping up and down on the bench by the time dinner was over and when they walked into the hall she came bounding up to Irene and hugged her arm,

“This is going to be so amazing! I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep.”

She froze at the contact but then slowly relaxed into the thin warm embrace at her side.

Sleep wouldn’t come easy for her tonight either but for a completely different reason.

Irene managed a quiet goodnight to her before she went back to the medical bay to stare at the painfully white walls until her eyes ached.

A fitful sleep finally came and when she awoke the next day she felt like she hadn’t slept at all. After a bland breakfast in the Mess she followed Molly down to the lower decks.

This time she kept a sharp eye on all the codes that Anderson, the head engineer, typed in the computers to make them open certain doors and operate vital machinery.

She soaked up all of this hungrily and stored it for later recall. A plan was starting to form vaguely and every bit of intelligence she could glean was vital.

Molly darted from stack of organized parts to stack of disorganized parts and started piling all the material she would need on a hovering dolly.  It dipped slightly when she had a robot arm lower an engine block larger than Irene on to it but other than that every part was moved smoothly to her workspace by the lift.

This time Irene did more than watch and comment on wire placement. She had Molly take her through the engine construction and deconstruction and then let Molly put it back together so she could take it apart. This went on back and forth all day.

Both girls were so engrossed they missed dinner and when her mother finally found both of them still sprawled hard at work on the metal grates she just sighed and brought them a meal. The next day was the same and so was the one after.

They developed a playful banter and Molly went from fumbling and awkward to vibrant and glowing with energy and genius. She could almost be content to go on like this for forever. Just building things with her and playing around with the guts of multiple ships all day.

But at the back of her mind she was memorizing every motion, wire, circuit, and tool she would need to take this entire ship to pieces as well as several later and newer models. One night after dinner they were sitting on the main observation deck alone and Molly asked her what she wanted to do when she grew up.

She knew what she wanted. She wanted to destroy the slave trade and bring the Orion Syndicate to its complete and ultimate ruin. She wanted to free women from the oppressive power structure they were being forced into and she wanted to continue to do whatever she wished without having to pretend it was what some man wanted her to do.

But she couldn’t tell her all this, there was no way she could explain what it felt like to her and have understand. For as wicked smart and blindingly wonderful as she was, Molly was a sweet, shy, child still. There were things that Irene already knew that she hoped Molly would never have to experience. That she wanted no one to ever experience again. So instead she told her a smaller part of her dreams,

“I want to be a space pirate! I want to live outside of the law and do what I want. I’m going to have my own ship and crew and travel every where in Federation and Neutral Space and no one will be able to stop me.”

She smiled and nodded,

“That sounds like a big adventure. I just want to be an engineer for Starfleet, maybe teach engineering at the Academy one day. And in my spare time work on ships and arrays and all sorts of machines.”

Irene grinned wickedly,

“That sounds dull. Maybe you should just come and work as Chief Engineer on my ship. The position is yours I’m not even making you interview for it.”

Molly laughed and kicked her feet against the railing as they looked out at the endless expanse of stars,

“We’ll see. I mean I’m only ten. A girl’s got to consider her options first.”

She got a pout in return,

“Come on. You honestly won’t find a better offer in Starfleet or anywhere in Federation Space for that matter."

“Nope. I’m keeping my horizons open as they say. No early commitments from me. You shouldn’t be asking me to anyway. You don’t even have a ship!”

Irene shook her head,

“It’s not a commitment I’ll regret later Molly. You’re amazing and a genius and I promise not to take another Chief Engineer until you agree to be mine.”

The space between them suddenly became intense and both girls backed away from each other. Something was going on with them that neither one could quite name but it was powerful and magnetizing and wholly terrifying. Molly cleared her throat in a tiny cough and said,

“If you want I can help build you a ship.”

Irene lit up at that and practically knocked her over with the force of her hug,

“Yes! Let’s build one together and when you graduate from the Academy we can both go away on it.”

Molly seemed to be deep in thought and said,

“Do you honestly think I can build an whole Cruiser in eight years while still going to Academy during the last four of that?”

Irene grinned,

“I believe with enough parts and energy you can build anything in eight years. A little old stealthy Cruiser should be easy.”

Molly crinkled her nose with her smile,

“Alright. But you have to help me. I’m not letting you off that easy.”

She smiled and nodded in response because she couldn’t trust her words not to betray her.

She wouldn’t be sticking around to watch Molly go off to Starfleet Academy that much she knew. There was no place for her in the Orion Syndicate but it was equally unlikely that she would be welcomed into Starfleet right now. She had the brains and ambition for it but she was too dangerous.

Biologically and mentally she was a loose laser canon. She didn’t play by any one’s rules but her own and never would and her pheromones could prove deadly in high dosages. In the long run she was going to have to go away. She had known it from the start but it was finally starting to set in.

Now that she had a true friend, some one she genuinely could trust and care about, she was going to have to leave her. Unexpected tears jumped to her eyes and she had to turn away and hop down from the railing. Molly turned to look at her questioningly but she shook her head and blew the tears and brown curls from her face.

“Goodnight Molls. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

She absently waved and heard a quiet good night as the doors silently clicked shut behind her.

That night in medical she stared up at the slightly dimmed lights and cried.

Sleep did not come.

When she went to breakfast Molly wasn’t there and slightly worried she headed down to her workspace. There were the sparks and the whirr of a plasma saw as Molly worked feverishly behind a large hydrogen turbine. When she moved back to grab a pair of safety glasses Molly flicked it off and lifted up her protective faceplate.

“Hey I have a present for you!”

Jumping back from the engine she reached into her coverall pocked and pulled out something glinting on a thin chain. It practically glowed as she dropped it expectantly into Irene’s hesitantly outstretched hand. It appeared to be a piece of jewelry of some sort. When she didn’t say any thing she started to shift nervously back and forth on her feet,

“It’s a locket. Well it’s my locket that my Mom gave to me and it has a baby picture of me in it. I want you to have it.”

She couldn’t find the right words to thank her.

“Why?”

That wasn’t what she had wanted to say but it was what slipped out. But instead of being shy or taking it back Molly squared her shoulders and met Irene’s confused gaze bravely,

“You’re my only friend. The first and only person who’s talked to me like I was a person not some genius baby or freaky mutant from under the bed. I can’t talk to adults because they treat me like a kid or like a stunted recluse adult and kids think I’m too weird to handle. But you just talk to me, tell me the truth and treat me fairly. I don’t know what I’d do without you. I was so alone. This is the least I can give you. Please take it.”

Irene had to gasp air to stop the tears but bit her lip through the watering eyes and quickly pulled the silver chained locket over her head. It was surprisingly warm against her chest.

There were so many things she wanted to say to her. Tell her how she was the only person she had trusted in her life. The only other person who had seen her laugh in ten years time. That she would kill for her, destroy ships, dismantle empires, and tear the universe asunder for her.

But she knew Molly wouldn’t understand let alone accept the things Irene was willing to do to herself now to spare Molly. There was only one part of herself she could never give up to her. Hoped that she would never ask her to. And that was her freedom. Which was why she couldn’t stay, qnd really shouldn’t take the locket.

She didn’t deserve it and she most certainly didn’t deserve the heart of the little girl that came with it. Selfishness was both her saving grace and her damning flaw so she instead hugged Molly fiercely and didn’t speak a word of how much she meant to her. Maybe she would understand through the sheer force of her will to hold on but she doubted it.

Irene would regret not saying anything for the rest of her life.  

The remainder of the day was spent working in a relatively companionable silence, passing laser and plasma tools back and forth and breaking and bending titanium. When dinner finally rolled around the heavy stone in her chest had moved to her stomach and she barely managed to eat a few bites before conversation from the bridge officer’s two tables over drifted towards them.

“Well we don’t have the resources let alone the leverage to let them go. We’ll have to turn them over to the delegation when we dock at the station.”

Irene went completely rigid and strained to hear the rest of the conversation.

“It’s not right. This whole situation is completely vile and the fact that all of you are willing to be complicit in it makes me sick.”

She chanced a glance at the man who was defending her people and saw that he was in his mid thirties with black hair that was graying slightly at the temples. Then some one else, a woman this time spoke,

“And I can’t believe you’re willing to be complicit in an intergalactic economic conflict, possibly an intergalactic war. Really Greg I know you’re from the outer rings of Federation Space but even you should know politics are rarely as black and white as history logs make them out to be.”

She was right.

There really was no way for the Federation to interfere with the slave trade in the Orion Syndicate without loosing a lot of the lucrative trade contracts and routes that helped the Federation prosper. And even if all they did was free one ship of slaves that they just so happened to accidentally be lured into boarding it would cause conflict and possibly even send all of the Shadow Syndicates after the Federation.

They certainly had the funds and firepower to do it, which was the scary part. The Syndicates, if they were to ever unify behind one leader, would be more than capable of taking over the Federation.

She should have predicted this; even the mighty Starfleet couldn’t rescue her and her people. The only person she could rely on was herself. And maybe Molly. It would have to be some one working outside of the Federation and all the Syndicates. Some one unaffiliated and completely under her own command to take down the slave trade and all the other dirty political and financial dealings of the Shadow Syndicates.  

The plan that had only been barely formed now slammed into place behind the lump in her throat and she knew what she had to do.

They were going to dock at the next station in two days. She was going to commandeer a stealthy, fast moving vessel that came to the same station as the ship that was going to take back the Orion Slaves and she was going to strike out on her own.

But to do it she would have to leave behind the only person who had ever really meant anything to her. She was going to have to break her heart, possibly both their hearts to be free. Now it was truly bigger than Irene. No one was going to stop the Syndicates besides her because no one else could.  

And so she slept long that night and the next day she talked nonstop.

Told Molly everything she liked about Orion, which was mostly the decorative style and cuisine. She talked about the books she read illegally on the interlink and even talked about silly things like her first crush a few years ago. Nothing things, everything she could think of. It was her locket to Molly. She hoped it would be enough.

When the next day finally came for them to dock at the station Irene finally rejoined the group of her people. Molly had to stay on the ship but before they had disembarked she had had a short chance to say good-bye.

“I still don’t understand why you have to leave! You’re so smart and great and you belong in Starfleet! You could apply for early admission, unlike me, you’re fifteen!”

Irene hugged her fiercely back and murmured,

“I don’t understand it either but I’ll come back for you. I promise. Nothing will stop me. I will come back.”

Molly snuffled but reluctantly let her go.

“I’m holding you to that Irene Adler. If you don’t I’ll come after you.”

She smiled lopsidedly and replied,

“I should certainly hope so. And when you find me you can give me a proper scolding.”

They both laughed and then hugged one last time before Irene made her way towards the throng of Orion people at the loading bay doors.

They waved mutely to each other. Irene from the loading bay and Molly from the observation deck. There were no tears just mute anguish.

She solemnly boarded the ship with the rest of the group but as soon as they were being hustled to the slave quarters she slipped back. The control panel to the loading bay doors was easy after the two weeks she had spent dismantling things resembling them.

She was outside the Orion vessel but not yet safe.

Irene had to liberate a ship; something fast and quiet and subtle. She scanned the docks and didn’t see much of interest. Then wedged in between two massive freighters she spotted it. A small Orion Blockade Runner. Well armed and tiny enough for her with a fairly competent A.I. to manage.

It was perfect.

She just hoped it wasn’t occupied by any one at the moment. After slinking along outside the vessel for a few minutes deciding whether or not to hot wire the bay doors, they slid open causing her to duck into the shadows around the massive freighter to the left of the ship. Two Orion men exited and she hoped desperately that they didn’t bring their slave women with them. She didn’t want to have to kill any one just yet but she would if there were no other means for her to escape.

Breaking into the ship was easy and once inside she did a quick search of the rooms before proceeding to the bridge. Once there she did a fast and dirty reprogramming of the A.I. At first it was giving her trouble but then she removed the main control board and manually overwrote its contrary personality and security features.

The first thing she did was have it scan for life on the ship other than herself, when it came back negative she huffed a breath she didn’t know she had been holding and then started the launch procedure.

Everything was on autopilot and running smoothly but she couldn’t get out of there fast enough. Those men were surely coming back not the mention she was probably setting off several docking alarms for an unauthorized launch right now. It really couldn’t be helped.

When she was far enough from the side of station she had the engine engage in full and she zipped off into Federation Space. There wasn’t any time to look back at the station and the S.S. Bartholomew as they transformed into specks behind her.

It was like the rest of her life, there would be very little time to look back.

* * *

 

But now she was glad she had taken the time to remember those few quiet weeks on the Starfleet Cruiser that had been the catalyst for the start of her vengeance.

The image of two small pale hands taking the multi-tool from her own dark green ones and loosening the control panel snapped her to attention.

Irene made quick work of manually rewiring the old worthless innards of the ship’s propulsion lines. It was a rough patch job but it should hold as long as she didn’t try to throw the damn thing into warp.

Grinning manically as the control panel and the engine roared to flickering life she started to program a course into the stubbornly bland ship A.I. Things were looking up.

And they just kept getting better and better, outside the observation window of the bridge she saw a large merchant freighter approaching her dead ahead. Her mind started flicking though multiple schemes to get the freighter to dock with her rust bucket so she could easily steal it.

A distress signal might be best but she was going to wait until it was closer. It needed to be within good eyesight so she could try and discern its purpose and crew count.

She instinctively placed her hand over the locket she still wore around her neck and decided now would be a good time to look in it again. Flipping it open a tiny holographic image of Molly as a chubby smiling baby hovered over it in her palm and she spoke the voice recognized password unlocking the massive data server she had installed inside it.

The necklace had been modified to store all the information she gathered on her missions and over the course of just being in places. It was constantly seeding and receiving data from her surroundings.

The locket was possibly the most advanced surveillance technology in the universe and no one knew it existed. Mostly because she had spent every moment she wasn’t using to maintain her ships and business contacts working on improving its storage and processing power.

She flicked her fingers absently over the sheen of blue light that was the menu screen of the database and selected her file on Molly. Academy graduate in Engineering recently assigned as assistant chief engineer on the U.S.S. Farragut.

It was a major Federation cruiser and a big achievement for some one so young and inexperienced in the actual field.

Irene wouldn’t have called it stalking but she had been keeping tabs on Molly from afar all these years. Making sure that that she was doing all right and was happy without her around. Because those words had cut her to what remained of her heart.

She had been so alone as well.

Taking one last look at the twenty five year old engineer who still had those innocent brown eyes and brilliant smile she flipped the locket shut and turned on the com stream. If she was going to hail the freighter she might as well set up an open channel. It was garbled but when she scrolled through recent text reports the whole monitor blinked blinding red and white with an emergency broadcast.

Vulcan had been completely annihilated and with it almost the entire Federation fleet of armed Cruisers. There was a scroll of missing, destroyed, and presumed destroyed ships.

The Farragut was on the destroyed list.

Irene was going to blow every cell in the fucking fusion generator of the ship trying to get to Molly but she had to get within Federation Space so she could find out what was actually going on. And more importantly find out if Molly Hooper was on the list of those rescued from escape pods.

She didn’t think twice before hailing the freighter with a distress call, she didn’t even have to fake the panic in her breathless voice. But her head was orderly and calculating. The freighter had warp drive. She would be within Federation Space in a few hours and to earth in a few more if she needed to be.

She wouldn’t stop until she had confirmation one way or another.

“Hello! My propulsion systems have failed and they are beyond repair for my engineer. If you rescue my crew and myself you are more than welcome to any salvage of the ship parts.”

They couldn’t see her shark-like grin of triumph otherwise they would have turned around and fled.

Instead the ship greedily pinged her back a response of their intent to board and rescue them. It was almost too easy. This part of her life always was.


End file.
